The last time Beth Tweddle visited the O2 Arena the Spice Girls were performing on their comeback tour; this Sunday Tweddle hopes to forge a comeback of her own as she plans to put the disappointments of the last few days behind her and go for a world championship medal on the floor.

Having failed to qualify for her favourite event, the uneven bars, unexpectedly crashing to the mat in the middle of her routine, Britain's only gymnast to win a world title believes that anything she achieves at this stage of her career is a bonus.

"When I first started I never dreamed of being an international champion or European champion," said the 24-year-old, who has been a pioneer and inspiration to the teenagers now following in her footsteps. Becky Downie and Rebecca Wing, who both qualified for tomorrow's all-around final, credit Tweddle for paving the way for their success.

"I've done a lot more than I or my coaches ever thought I would," said Tweddle. "The only thing [her coach] Amanda [Kirby] ever says to me is, 'do what you do in the gym'. She's never said I have to get a medal, and it's the same philosophy for this competition."

Tweddle, who won gold at the European Championships on the floor this year, will be competing against unfamiliar faces as many names have retired or taken a break from the sport. "With it being a new Olympic cycle you never know who's going to be there. We didn't see many familiar faces on the scene this year."

This was especially true of the floor event, in which the most impressive qualifier was a virtually unknown Russian, Anna Myzdrikova, who performed a beautiful and technically complex routine. Also in the running for a podium finish are China's Sui Lu and Deng Linlin – the latter taking the all-around competition by storm – and Romania's Ana Porgras. Tweddle qualified in fourth place with a score of 14.075, despite an almighty wobble after her opening tumble sequence. Should she execute a solid performance she is almost certain to come away with a medal as her routine is the most technically demanding of the field.

Downie, the 17-year-old who so impressed at the Olympics earning Britain's highest ever finish in an individual all-around final when she came 12th in Beijing last summer, admits she felt the weight of expectation after Tweddle's fall from the bars. "I did feel a bit more pressure then," she said, "I was a bit shocked that Beth fell. It was a huge disappointment for the whole team really because she was a big medal hope for us."

The nerves clearly got to her as the girl who won bronze on the beam at the Commonwealth Games aged 14, went careering backwards as she fudged her dismount on the same apparatus. "I wasn't very happy with the dismount," she said . "I wasn't really expecting to roll off the podium so that was a bit of a first for me and it made it a little bit more humorous than it actually was. Hopefully I'll put the mistakes behind me and come back strongly in the final."

Clean routines on the vault and floor bumped up her score, but the shaky performance on the uneven bars – echoing Tweddle's slip-ups – kept her down in 20th place. "It wasn't the routine we had planned. I had to use my escape routes," said Downie, "but at least I got from start to finish. I just want to do the best I can with the routines I've got and hopefully get rid of the mistakes and improve on the little details. Obviously the higher I can finish the nicer it will be. I have the potential to go quite a long way if I hit the routines so I just have to focus and not worry so much about the scores and positions."

A fierce battle to reach the podium is expected between the top performers with the US teenagers Rebecca Bross and Bridget Sloan, comfortably filling the shoes of Shawn Johnson and Nastia Liukin, the Olympic medal winners taking a break after Beijing, and China's Deng and Yang Yilin jostling for the medals. Australia's Lauren Mitchell, Russia's Ekaterina Kurbatova, and Porgras are also in the hunt.